The Box is a major cultural and heritage attraction and archive, which opened in Plymouth’s city centre in September 2020. Its collection, formally the South West Film and Television Archive (SWFTA), is the regional film archive for the South West of England, comprising the combined programme libraries of Westward Television and Television South West (TSW). It also includes a significant number of donated film collections dating back to the early 1890s.
This film is part of Free
Beryl Cook at Home
The people’s painter who dared to defy the art world.
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Overview
Beryl Cook is a people’s painter who paints people. Her rambunctious round characters are portrayed with hidden stories hinted at in the facial expressions of the busy full-framed depictions. Accompany this with a humorous title and you laugh twice as in Sabotage where a misplaced finger near a woman’s bowls tells us just what sort of sabotage is going on. Cook’s art is accessible, understandable and playful. Cook’s paintings hang in museums in Glasgow and Plymouth.
The seaside port once bustling with navy in Sailors And Seagulls, shopping in Tesco and skateboarding in Punks On The Hoe are examples of Beryl Cook’s captured social commentary based on ordinary everyday lives. Her observations of the world about her are taken from sketches of the places she regularly visited such as The Dolphin, a pub on Plymouth’s Barbican, a local tattoo parlour, shops and the Hoe. She unashamedly committed to canvas sailors surrounded by prostitutes, heady beach scenes, men and women in flirtatious holds with alcohol and cigarettes aplenty and all with an attention to fashion, food and facial expression. Filmed Artworks are subject to Copyright 2016 John Cook. All rights reserved.
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